This list includes many perspectives on the crisis: traditional
Catholic, progressive Catholic, and analysis by scholars and journalists
unaffiliated with the church. Listing does not constitute endorsement.
Please email
us with suggestions for adding to the list.

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The Investigative Staff
of the Boston Globe, Betrayal: The Crisis in the Catholic
Church (Boston MA: Little, Brown, 2002). Amazon
Hardcover Price: $16.77

An account of the crisis from a Boston perspective, by the Pulitzer
Prize-winning team that covered the story so aggressively for the
Boston Globe in 2002. With 40 pages of documents in facsimile.

"The only reason that some of the truth has been revealed
is because the Boston Globe got a judge to open documents
that the Boston archdiocese fought to keep closed." - Peggy Noonan,
Wall Street Journal

Catechism of the
Catholic Church (2d ed., Washington DC: United
States Catholic Conference, 2000) with glossary and analytical index.
Amazon Paperback Price: $10.47

The official compendium of Catholic doctrine sets out church teaching
on such relevant matters as homosexuality, the role of bishops, and
the status of the laity.

Cozzens draws on his experience as a seminary rector to examine the
problems and promise of the contemporary priesthood. Includes a frank
discussion of seminary formation and homosexuality among priests.

"The reading and discussion of this work by priests and
parishioners alike will provide insight, argumentation, challenge
and hope." - Bishop Robert Morneau

Gathers four works by Newman that pertain to current discussions of
doctrine, dissent, papal authority, and the role of the laity: The
Theory of Developments in Religious Doctrine, An Essay on the Development
of Christian Doctrine, "On Consulting the Faithful in Matters
of Doctrine," and "Letter Addressed to His Grace the Duke
of Norfolk."

George Weigel, The
Courage to Be Catholic: Crisis, Reform, and the Future of the Church(New York: Basic, 2002). Amazon Hardcover Price: $15.40

Offers fidelity as a solution to the crisis, against the claims of
the "Light Brigade," whose dissenting Catholicism, Weigel
argues, is responsible for the mess.

"Anybody ... will
find here a short, masterful, information-packed examination, a book
that is thoroughly trustworthy, and spot-on." - National
Review Online

Robert McClory, Faithful
Dissenters: Stories of Men and Women Who Loved and Changed the Church
(New York: Orbis, 2001). Amazon Paperback Price: $11.20

Tells the stories of Catherine of Siena, Thomas Aquinas, Mary Ward,
Yves Congar, and others who were viewed as dissenters by some of their
contemporaries, but who helped the church change and are no longer
seen as dissenting.

"Makes fascinating and instructive
reading for all those who are convinced that faith is not an immovable
set of propositions, but rather an organic and growing treasure."
- William J. La Due

Groeschel examines the roots of the current troubles, both within
and without the Catholic church. Calling upon the example of St. Francis,
the founder of the rule he and his fellow Franciscans observe, Fr.
Benedict encourages Catholics "to rebuild the Church, which is
falling into ruin."

An orthodox analysis of the crisis that traces the problem to seminary
formation which, in Rose's view, prefers dissenting and homosexual
candidates to orthodox and heterosexual ones.

"A devastating
account of what has been going on in Catholic seminaries. It will
unnerve readers of all philosophical bents and is certain to provoke
a very spirited debate." - William A. Donohue, President of the
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights

Frank Bruni and Elinor
Burkett, A Gospel of Shame: Children, Sexual Abuse, and the Catholic
Church (New York: Harper Perennial, 2002, with
a new introduction and afterword by the authors; originally published
by Viking, 1993). Amazon Paperback Price: $11.16

An early study that analyzes the cooperation between church and government
to keep clergy abuse secret. One focus of the book is Frank Fitzpatrick's
successful pursuit of James Porter.

"What makes the
book noteworthy is its attempt to show the hesitation by the media,
the mental health community, and law enforcement agencies to treat
priests like other sexual offenders." - Library Journal

A firsthand look at the people, the politics, and the organization
of the Vatican, including the Congregation for the Doctrine of the
Faith, now so important in the church's handling of abuse cases.

"This even-handed and meticulously researched study of Vatican
City and the papal bureaucracy couldn't come at a better time."
- San Francisco Chronicle

Jason Berry, Lead
Us Not into Temptation: Catholic Priests and the Sexual Abuse of Children
(Urbana IL: University of Illinois Press, 2000; originally published
by Doubleday, 1992). Amazon Paperback Price: $13.97

Jason Berry's groundbreaking story of the Gauthe sexual abuse case
in Louisiana and its continuing implications.

"The church
itself could not have asked for a more fair-minded instrument of its
own indictment." -USA Today

Paul Lakeland, The
Liberation of the Laity: In Search of an Accountable Church
(New York: Continuum, 2002). Amazon Hardcover Price: $20.27

Lakeland, professor of religious studies at Fairfield University,
surveys the development of a theology of the laity between the first
and second Vatican Councils, culminating in the work of Yves Congar.
He describes how the church can recover from what he sees as the missed
opportunities of the post-conciliar years and bring accountability
to the bishops through lay involvement in ministry and governing structures.

"Nothing less than a blueprint for the future of the church....
His theology of the laity is indeed liberating--and timely."
- Donald Cozzens

An entirely new and comprehensive commentary by canonists from North
America and Europe, with a revised English translation of the Code,
this book was commissioned by the Canon Law Society of America. It
is an essential tool for researching the church law of tribunals,
pastoral and finance councils, and lay associations.

"Its
historical depth and interpretive balance render the meaning of the
canons accessible not only to canon lawyers but to all those in the
church and beyond it who want to understand canon law." - Margaret
A. Farley, Yale University Divinity School

Paul E. Dinter, The
Other Side of the Altar: One Man's Life in the Catholic Priesthood
(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003). Amazon Hardcover Price:
$16.10

Dinter describes his life as a priest ordained in the sixties, his
struggle with celibacy, and his departure from the priesthood in 1994,
disillusioned by what he sees as a church culture of denial and duplicity.

A challenging and revisionist analysis published after the Porter
scandal. "Describes the different connstituencies active in recognizing
and delineating the emerging problem," including the media, therapists,
traditionalists and progressives, feminists, and lawyers.

"A fine cautionary tale that should give all parties to the pedophile-priest
crisis something to think about." - New York Times Book Review

American Catholicism "is on the verge of either an irreversible
decline or a thoroughgoing transformation," according to Steinfels,
veteran religion reporter and writer of the "Beliefs" column
for the New York Times.

"If you want to know
what is happening in the American Catholic Church, you must read this
book. It is provocative. You may find yourself arguing with the author's
diagnoses or his prescriptions for the future, but you will not be
able to ignore him." - Monika Hellwig, President of the Association
of Catholic Colleges and Universities

Sipe's second book on the crisis analyzes sexual abuse, AIDS in the
priesthood, and other problems, and their source, as he sees it, in
seminary formation and a fundamental tension between church structures
and doctrine and the biology of sexuality.

An anthology of essays by Philip Lawler, Michael Novak, Rod Dreher,
Mark Shea, and others. Sections on understanding and responding to
the crisis are supplemented by scripture readings, reflections, prayers,
and a small collection of responses from church officials.

"Jordan investigates the ambiguous nature
of the historical and the contemporary relationship between Catholicism
and male homosexuality. Arguing that the Catholic Church is paradoxically
both homophobic and homoerotic, he analyzes the established, and essentially
hypocritical, church rhetoric concerning sexual morality." -
Margaret Flanagan, Booklist

Eugene Kennedy, The
Unhealed Wound: The Church, the Priesthood, and the Question of Sexuality
(New York: St. Martin's, 2001). Amazon Paperback Price $10.36

A study of human sexuality and the institutional church.

"Kennedy is a long-time observer of a church he clearly loves....
The Unhealed Wound will be a source of healing and liberation."
- National Catholic Reporter

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